To portray the political and economic chaos that gripped the United Kingdom last week as yet another prime minister crashed and burned, the British magazine The Economist branded the country “Britaly.” The portmanteau told the story, likening Britain to Italy, Europe’s legendarily dysfunctional political spectacle.
Italy’s perennial melodrama was suspended for 20 months when Mario Draghi, the sober former head of the European Central Bank, was named to lead a technocratic government of national unity in February 2021. That briefly brought a sense of competence and stability to Italian politics. But, however much Italians complained about the stereotype embedded in The Economist’s moniker for Britain, the country has now returned to form. The Draghi era has been confirmed as having been merely an interlude.
Following the recent elections in which the far right emerged victorious, the political sideshow is back on in Rome, and it is sure to become more destabilizing in the months to come.